Socialist Realisms in the World (Of Russian Imperialism)

Session Submission Type: Roundtable

Brief Description

This roundtable addresses how different aesthetic practitioners around the world interpreted Socialist Realist ideals of collectivity. It foregrounds examples from Russia, Ukraine, Hungary, North Africa and the United States, from the 1930s until the present day, considering the emancipatory as well as the regressive functions of Socialist Realism. Russia's current brutal war against Ukraine incorporates mutated tropes and symbols from the Soviet period, including war against Nazi Germany. At the same time, it is illogically framed by Russian war propaganda as a simultaneous project of "de-nazification" and "de-communization". How can an analysis of Socialist Realism shed light on the political aesthetics of Russia's war? How embedded is Socialist Realism in imperialist and colonialist languages, heritages and processes? What is the role of "realism" in intensifying or helping to clear up the fog of war? How can we "decolonize" Socialist Realism and the study of Soviet aesthetics and materialities in the face of the imperial violence inherent to the Soviet past and the post-Soviet present?

Sub Unit

• Arts: Art History, Architecture, Dance, Museum, Music, Photography, Theatre 

Chair

• Jane Ashton Sharp, Rutgers, The State U of New Jersey

Roundtable Members

• Adrienn Kacsor, Northwestern U

• Christina Kiaer, Northwestern U

• Olena Martynyuk, Columbia U

• Maria Mileeva, The Courtauld Institute of Art (UK)

• Michał Murawski, U College London (UK)